The Captain and The Soldier - Shopping
by Miarka
Summary: Part of my Stucky drabbles collection. Steve takes Bucky shopping in preparation for their new life. Please read and review. Enjoy.


"I don't get it, Steve. We're moving in two weeks and you're taking me shopping?"

"Lighten up. There's never a bad time to go shopping. Besides you can't keep borrowing my clothes." Steve replied as Bucky frowned at him from beneath the dark drapes of his long hair.

"You sound just like the girls I used to date….back then, you know." He replied giving a little jerky nod. He didn't like speaking out about the war or much else before his time under the ice, he simply referred to it as 'back then' and Steve understood. "And why not? I like your clothes." He said, glancing down at smart button up shirt and jacket Steve had put him in, fumbling with the material.

"Because they are my clothes." Steve said, eyeing his best friend and wishing he wouldn't do that. "Geez Buck, you're calling me a dame, don't act like some overly attached girlfriend." He countered, trying to laugh it off. "Now come on." He said dragging him round the huge clothing store. "Let's get you some of your own clothes."

But Bucky went slowly, dragging his one flesh hand across every piece of clothing he could touch. When they passed through the woman's section Steve kept on walking ahead and then having turn back to fetch Bucky who was slowly dragging his hand along some garment made of silk or velvet.

"It's velvet. People rarely had stuff like this back then. It was too expensive to get, what with all the shipping risks and rations." Steve told him as he approached Bucky again for the third time.

"I remember. Your mother had a velvet dress from years before; she rarely wore it, only on very special occasions. I only ever saw her wear it once, it always made me feel kinda sad that something so beautiful was so hardly used." He shrugged and then smirked. "I remember the first time I saw it, we were just kids, you bragged about your mother owning a velvet dress and showed me, even though you weren't supposed to touch it. When she caught us looking at the thing she scolded us both and then we ran down to the other end of the street and stayed there all afternoon to escape her."

When Bucky looked back up from the fabric Steve was staring at him. "I'd forgotten about that."

Bucky smirked and rolled his shoulders back the way he always did when he tried to lighten things. "What can I say, they can't chain me."

And then the moment died because even when Bucky joked about what had happened to him, being the winter soldier, being under the ice, being a slave, which was rare in itself, Steve became dead serious because he couldn't forgive himself for a crime he'd never committed.

A silence filled between them, an uncomfortable one unbroken by rattle of people around them in the store and the jingling music flowing unendingly from the speakers. It was unbroken until Bucky realised his grasp from the velvet dress and dropped his hand to entwine his fingers with Steve's.

Steve glanced down to his fingers encased in Bucky's and then back up to Bucky's face.

"Come on." Bucky said, giving Steve's hand a squeeze. "Take me shopping."

"Black Sabbath, what does that even mean? Why would someone want to darken the Sabbath day?" Bucky asked staring confused at one of the many bad t-shirts in the men's department.

"It's a bad, Buck." Steve said chuckling. "Tony likes them."

"Oh does _Tony_? Well then we've all got to like them." Bucky replied with sarcasm and cheek.

"Hey it's not like that, the guy annoys me too. I just know that he has a t-shirt of them, I saw him wearing it once, so I assume he likes them."

"I don't get it, are we all Anti-Christ worshippers now?"

"No, people have just become a lot more….artistic in the past seventy years."

"Still it just doesn't feel right."

"Well I don't know if you remember but I'm the one who made you drag your butt of to church every Sunday, you hated going."

"No it's not that." Bucky replied turning away with a dark look. "It's here, being here doesn't feel right. I'm still lost, Steve."

"Hey it's okay." Said Steve, darting around from the other side of the clothing rack and coming close to Bucky.

"No don't say that." Bucky snapped. "Because it's not okay. I'm not okay."

"I know." Steve said finally, his voice a little shaky. "I know you're not okay Buck. I'm wholly not either. I can't expect to be and I'm not asking you to be. Hey look at me." He said clasping his hands over Bucky's, the one with warm skin and the one covered by a leather glove beneath which lay cold metal, Steve loved both, Steve loved all of Bucky, broken as he was. That got Bucky's attention, those icy blue eyes stared back at Steve and he almost lost his words for a second. "Listen, I'm never going to ask anything of you, anything at all. You just find your way back, and I'll stand right beside you as you do."

For a moment Steve thought he'd got Bucky off the angst train but then the dark-haired man pulled free of his grasp and ducked underneath the rails, hiding among the shirts.

"Bucky." Steve moaned in exasperation before ducking into the clothes as well.

He found himself crouching low as he was squeezed together between prints of many colours, Bucky was there too, his face inches away from Steve's in the small space.

"Bucky, please, we can't be here. Com-"

But his words were cut short as Bucky leaned forward and grabbed Steve; his hands cupped on his neck, and planted a kiss on Steve's mouth.

"Okay, you have my complete attention." Steve mumbled when Bucky pulled away.

"Steve, what are we going to do? I'm a mess. And we can't be like this."

"Like this." Bucky said, looking at him and pressing his forehead into the other mans. Steve understood. "We can't, I mean you're Captain America and I'm…well I don't even know, but I know it's nothing good. Even if you tell it's fine now, for people to be like this, it doesn't mean people will be fine with us."

"Screw people." Steve replied abruptly, a little surprised that he'd said it himself. "Ever since I woke caring about other people is all I've done, don't we get something for once? Bucky" He shifted, legs growing awkward and tired from crouching "do you realise I could have almost any of those people but I only want one. I only want you."

This time it was Bucky's turn to be cut off, as he opened his mouth for a quick reply it was suddenly met with the taste of Steve on them as the captain pressed his lips against the soldier's.

Steve sighed as pulled back and rested his forehead on Bucky's once again. "We've waited a long time for this, Buck. I won't let it slip away from me for the world."

Bucky glanced up at him, looking like he was going to say something else, then in true Bucky fashion he abruptly completely changed the subject. "What's this one?" He asked Steve, pulling back the gap in the shirts slightly to reveal a grey printed tee.

Steve looked over at it. "Guns n' Roses." He replied "Another band."

"One that Tony likes?" Bucky replied mockingly.

"I don't know." Steve said with a smile. "They have a few good songs, you'd probably like them. Come on." He said and pulled himself out the other side of the clothing rack; Bucky followed and took the t-shirt off the rail, studying the printed logo.

"It's what they all call rock 'n' roll. It suits you."

"How so?"

"Oh, the hair, the dark and angsty attitude. You've already got the look you just need the clothes." Steve replied with a teasing voice.

Bucky smiled as usual, genuinely even though it was still a smirk. For some reason Bucky was reluctant to get his hair cut, even after he'd got back, he had it washed and was well looked after by Steve but had never once shown interest in taking a trip to a barbers shop. It was like a small part of the wild winter soldier that he refused to cut off. Steve had never questioned him about it, he secretly adored it.

"I need some long sleeved shirts too." Bucky said.

Steve nodded understandingly. Although he'd tried to convince Bucky that there was nothing wrong with showing his metal arm Bucky was having none of it. He didn't dare go out without a jacket or long sleeved shirt covering his arm and a leather glove permanently on the hand. It was the part of him that he couldn't change, couldn't escape from and he hated it, no matter how hard Steve tried to convince him otherwise. It was stronger, more advanced than prosthetic arms. It reminded Bucky that he was different and it filled him with regret of a time he'd lost.

Neither of the two men said anything about this, but they both knew they were thinking on it. Finally Bucky cleared his throat. "Well come on, Steve, like I said we haven't got all the time in the world if in two weeks we're going to be living in New York."


End file.
